In Alief ISD, kids go back to school — online
After months of planning, students are first in area to log on again for classes
The first-period bell did not ring at 7:20 a.m. on the first day of school at Alief ISD’s Hastings High School. Nor did it for second period, or the third.
There were no students for Principal Lynette Miller to greet at the bus ramp, no stragglers to usher into classrooms. It was just her, two secretaries, a registrar and the silence.
“You could almost hear the building sort of settle, and the creaks and cracks that happen, while school was going on,” Miller said.
While campuses across the southwest Houston district were practically empty Thursday morning, many of
Alief ISD’s roughly 45,300 students began powering up their computers and logging into Zoom video calls that served as virtual classrooms. They and their teachers were the first in the greater Houston region to begin their school year; the vast majority of other local school districts will join them online in the coming weeks.
It took months of planning to get to Day One of Alief’s 2020-2021 school year. Schools handed out more than 14,000 laptops and 5,500 internet hot spots to families who lacked the technology. Teachers spent months reworking curricula for lessons, including science labs that typically require hands-on participation. Prin
“When you start 100 percent virtual, there’s this extra nervousness. Are we ready?”
Alief ISD Superintendent HD Chambers
cipals and school staff called thousands of families across the district to make sure they knew that the school year was starting at their homes Thursday instead of their children’s campuses. Food workers handed out about 1,700 cold breakfasts and 1,700 cold lunches Wednesday evening so students would have meals ready to go on their first day of classes.
Some parents had worried about what returning to virtual school would look like after many struggled to help their students make the transition in midMarch, when schools were ordered closed to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus.
For 13-year-old Jema Dietzel and her father, Jeff, Thursday went better than expected.
She woke up around 8, ate a bowl of Frosted Flakes, brushed her hair and logged on to Schoology, the district’s online learning platform. First period was U.S. history at 8:40 a.m., so she clicked into a Zoom meeting with her teacher and classmates.
Like most first days of school, not much happened aside from introductions and a review of expectations. After about 45 minutes, the class ended, and Jema had a few minutes before second period began — following the bell schedule she normally would have at Albright Middle School.
It was a far cry from what she saw in spring, when her father said Jema would spend only about two hours a day doing school work.
“It was more organized,” Jema said. “They put things together a lot better. In spring they just assigned assignments and expected you to do it until 11:59. We didn’t have Zoom meetings every day.”
It took a tremendous effort to get there, said Superintendent HD Chambers, who said he was awed by the work that staff put in over the summer to prepare for the first day of online classes.
On most first days of school, Chambers said he texts transportation supervisors to see if the buses are running on schedule.
“This year, I’m asking, ‘Do we have any outages with Schoology? Is the help desk being bombarded with questions?’ ” he said. “When you start 100 percent virtual, there’s this extra nervousness. Are we ready?”
On the surface, it appeared the district was. No widespread outages were reported, although individual students and teachers may have experienced issues. Jema said Zoom froze on her a few times — a frustration now well known to students and workers across the country.
At Hastings High, Miller said she arrived on campus at 5:20 a.m., earlier than normal, thanks to nerves. It ended up being fortuitous — Schoology apparently had reset the night before, and a handful of co-teachers and substitutes were unable to log on.
Only about three of the school’s 3,200 students showed up to campus before first period. She thought that might happen, so she waited out front to make sure their parents did not speed off only to realize school was starting online. Although it was quiet inside, Miller kept busy.
She helped answer teachers’ technical questions and popped into Zoom classes throughout the day. It was bittersweet watching the virtual instruction, she said.
“It’s great to see them in Zoom talking and engaging, but it is challenging,” Miller said. “It’s hard not just for students, but teachers love engaging with their kiddos, and we haven’t seen them since before spring break.”
There still are issues to work out, Chambers said. Employees have not been able to reach all of the families they think still have school-age children within the district’s boundaries, something that happens every year but is made more difficult by the remote start.
Kids and teachers also are more distracted at home, especially if other family members are around or pets start making noise while they are on a Zoom call. He said he hopes staff can make headway on those issues in the coming weeks.
Back at the Dietzel home, Jema said she just hopes to make good grades this year. She and her father elected to keep her online even when Alief ISD campuses reopen for in-person instruction. They and other families have the option to switch to in-person or virtual instruction every nine weeks, and Jema longs for the day she can return.
“I want COVID to be over so in the last nine weeks I could go to school and at least see some people,” she said.